


A final conversation

by crm16



Series: Talking around the issue [3]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Jon and Theon finally manage to talk to each other like semi-regular people, Robb is only mentioned, This one’s kind of a bummer folks, unfortunately
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-08 11:48:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19106485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crm16/pseuds/crm16
Summary: Jon and Theon have a conversation by the Winterfell Crypts, before the battle with the Night King’s army.





	A final conversation

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t know if the stuff about Robb in the crypts is technically accurate, but it made sense in the context of this fic. So we’ll all just have to live with it.
> 
> Some of this may not make sense if you haven’t read part 1 and 2.

Jon should be spending this time with someone, anyone. Seeing as this may very well be the last night of his life. But everyone, having similar ideas, seems to be off doing other things.

Arya was off lurking somewhere he had no hope of finding her. Sansa was talking with Theon. Tormund was getting drunk, possibly with Davos, which he desired no part in. Sam was with Gilly. And he could not stand the thought of talking with Bran or, gods forbid, Dany. 

In light of the recent revelations regarding his parentage, he’s finding it difficult to continue even with his internal conversations with Robb. Avoiding the memory of him as much as he is avoiding Arya and Sansa in person. Of all the things he is struggling to reconcile with himself, the prospect of not being their brother may be the most difficult. 

Perhaps it’s for the best. With the dead hours away, and his own personal life in upheaval, he doubts he’d make good company, even to someone who only exists in his mind. 

So Jon goes where he often goes when things are bleak. The Winterfell Crypts. Come tomorrow they will be a busy place, full of those unable to join the fight. But tonight he will more than likely be the only living thing to walk there. 

As he nears the entrance he hears foot steps, drawing nearer. He looks back, dreading who he might see approaching, and is surprised to find Theon behind him. Looking sheepish. 

“I thought you were with Sansa.”

“She went to check on something, she’ll be back in a moment. Are you busy?” He asks, eyes skipping from Jon’s face to the crypt and back. The few times that Jon has seen him, since his return from rescuing his sister, he’s seemed better. More peaceful with himself, maybe. But he still rarely looks Jon in the eye. 

“No.” Jon replies, turning to face him fully and wrestling his face into something civil. He’s been trying, for Sansa’s sake, to be nicer to him. For Sansa, and as always, for the man whose memory seems to haunt them both. 

Theon seems to debate with himself for a moment, “I don’t... know quite what it is I want to say to you. I just wanted to say something. In light of what’s coming.” He says finally.

“‘What’s coming’ meaning our likely deaths?” Jon asks, the question coming out more grim than grimly humorous, as he’d intended. 

Theon goes a little paler, but the corner of his mouth ticks up as well. 

“I’m hoping it will end in our favor, but yes. I wanted to make sure things were right between us, before whatever happens... happens.”

Jon frowns, “I already told you I’ve forgiven you, for the things that are mine to forgive.” 

“I know, but it feels as if there’s something we’ve avoided.” He’s being delicate about it, but they both know what he means. Who he means. 

“I... that was included, in my forgiveness.” Jon says, haltingly. The truth in that statement does not make it easier to say.

“Was it?” Theon asks, looking more resigned than hopeful. 

“For the part of it that was mine to forgive, yes,” Jon assures, “But part of it is his to forgive. And as much as I try to consider his thoughts in my life, I can't give you that forgiveness for him.”

.....

Theon doesn't laugh, but it's a close thing. He and Snow have always been more alike than they're willing to acknowledge. Some of his mirth must show on his face, because Jon frowns a bit.

"I do that too," Theon admits, seeing no reason to keep tiptoeing around things, "Talk to him, try and picture how he would feel about things."

Jon blinks at him for a minute before he gives a sad sort of grin. 

"I suppose that shouldn't surprise me."

He looks more approachable than Theon's seen him in some time, or perhaps it's just that Theon is finding less reasons to be afraid, so he asks the question that’s been eating at him.

"When you were... did you see him?"

Jon sighs and looks away, "No. No, there was nothing."

Theon had been afraid he'd say something to that effect.

"Perhaps it's because you weren't going to stay... that way?" He offers.

Jon shrugs, looking away. "I hope so." He pauses, before adding, quieter, "I miss him."

"So do I."

They lapse into silence. For the first time in a long time, he doesn’t feel as if there is some silent third member of their conversation. He’d thought it would be worse, at Winterfell, with so much as it used to be. Like it would highlight the glaring differences, the losses and changes of this place he’d called home. This place they both had.

In some ways it had. With the majority of the Stark siblings returned, albeit much changed, Theon had spent his first few days back in a daze. Feeling like he was peering into some strange version of events where the Starks remained in their home, seeing Robb out of the corner of his eye everywhere he went, and on a few notable and jarring occasions, Rickon. 

But as he became reacquainted with these new, strange Starks, the feeling had faded. It was impossible to reconcile any of them with a world in which they’d been able to finish growing up here. And with that knowledge the past had receded. 

To a degree so had his conversations with Robb. The extent to which his wayward siblings had changed, had been forced to change, would cause him a great deal of grief. In a way Theon feels he needs to protect Robb from that, even if it’s only the version of Robb he keeps in his head.

Jon shifts, opening his mouth then closing it, like he’s trying to decide whether or not to speak. 

“I was going to the Crypts.” He says, a little hesitantly.

“Of course,” Theon says, feeling foolish, “I’m sorry to keep you.”

He goes to turn, planning to find a place to wait for Sansa to return, when stilted gesture from Jon stops him.

“Have you... been there since your return?”

“No,” Theon admits, “I didn’t want to intrude.”

He can’t, for the life of him, figure out what Jon’s point is.

“Sansa had a statue made. For Robb.”

Oh.

“Oh.” Theon says, “I thought that the Frey’s hadn’t...” He trails off. He cannot remember the last time one of them said Robb’s name out loud. 

Jon sighs, “They didn’t. But she had a statue made all the same.”

He turns to the heavy door, and pauses with his hand on the handle.

“You would not be intruding.” He says, before pulling it open. 

.....

The Crypts are as cold as always, and the echoes of their footsteps bounce back eerily. Jon leads the way. He comes here more often than he would freely admit, and the path is familiar. 

The come to a stop in front of Robb’s statue, a direwolf carved in a vague approximation of Grey Wind curls at his feet. In all honesty it is a bad likeness. There were no carvers remaining who had known Robb, and though Sansa’s descriptions were likely exhaustive, it is difficult to replicate the face of a man you’d never met. 

There is a sculpture of their- her father next to Robb, which is much the same. 

Though who is to say if that is not true of all whose statues stand silently in these crypts. Jon has not known any but these two in life. How can you recreate a living thing in something so far from life as stone, and expect it to reflect the truth of them?

He often looks at Lyanna’s statue, searching for an echo of his own face.

Theon hovers quietly behind him, obviously feeling out of place. Jon makes no attempt to reassure him, he has made all the reassurances with Theon that he feels himself capable of. 

Though he does regret telling Theon that he had experienced nothing during his brief stint among the dead. It is a lie he has told everyone that has asked, but telling it to Theon weighs on him more than with most. Perhaps because he would benefit more from the truth than the others. But at this point Jon is half certain that there really had been nothing, and that his hazy memory is only something he’d tried to convince himself of after the fact.

“Sansa will be returning soon.” Theon says eventually, still gazing at the statue. His expression is not one that Jon feels capable of naming. He thinks perhaps his own expression mirrors it. 

“I doubt we will get the chance to speak again before the battle begins.” Jon says, though he is unsure of what to follow that statement with. And they pass another moment in silence.

“I’ll give him your best. If I don’t come through this.” Theon says suddenly, turning to him.

“I’ll do the same.” Jon replies, not bothering to try and reiterate his earlier statement concerning the afterlife. 

The side of Theon’s mouth ticks up again, and he offers Jon his hand.

“Good luck to you, Snow.” He says, eyes steady on Jon.

Jon clasps his hand.

“And you Greyjoy.”

Theon nods at him, before releasing his hand and returning to the stairs. 

Jon spares a final glance at Robb’s statue, then ventures farther into the Crypts.

.....

“You’re a good man Theon.” Bran tells him, “Thank you.”

And what is there to do then but run? 

Towards the danger this time. Finally. 

It is not a long fight.

He hopes he will be able to deliver his message, as promised.

.....

Jon watches from a distance as Sansa carefully slips a direwolf pin through a strap in Theon’s armor. He feels a million years older than he had standing in the Crypts only hours ago. 

He bounces back and forth between grief and a mild pang of jealousy. If Davos is to be believed, there would no longer have been a Red Woman to drag him back to this world so full of conflict and strife, had things ended differently.

He shakes off those thoughts. He knows, looking at Sansa, and Arya standing behind him with Bran, that he is glad to have made it through this most recent conflict. There is still much to do, and dwelling on his own mortality is of little use. Just a complication he can’t afford in an already overcomplicated life.

He hopes he makes it to wherever Robb is someday, but to hold that hope so close will not lead him anywhere good. If he wishes to remain amongst living, and he does, then he needs to look forward. 

He says his part to those assembled, and strides forward with the others, torch in hand. 

_I hope he made it to you Robb, wherever you are._ He thinks, with a note of finality. 

And as the pyres go up, Jon lets another complication, however dear, go up with them.

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t know about ya’ll, but season 8 was pretty rough for me. I considered absolutely disregarding the whole thing and not writing a third part, but it felt weirdly unfinished. This will be the last part in this series, but probably not my last fic for the fandom. Especially if/when GRRM releases another book.


End file.
